According to the World Bank, the COVID-19 pandemic is going to exacerbate the situation of poverty. It predicts that the poverty rate could rise by 0.3 to 0.7 percentage points, to around 9% in 2020. This study aims at providing insights into poverty in Pakistan and analyzes the impact of fiscal decentralization on poverty alleviation. According to the Asian Development Bank, Pakistan houses roughly 210 million poor people. This study follows the data between 1975 and 2018, applying a unit root test to station this data. The statistical models are developed with a view to the autoregressive distributed lag co-integration technique for estimation. The findings of the study conclude that fiscal decentralization has a direct and indirect impact in eradicating poverty. We thus conclude that the government should provide autonomy to the provinces in Pakistan, as the central government alone cannot tackle and understand the local problems. Therefore, the government must adopt a fiscal decentralization policy. This study further suggests that the government should effectively utilize the progressive taxation strategy to maximize revenues and cater to poverty alleviation.

中文翻译：

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财政分权与扶贫：以巴基斯坦为例

据世界银行称，COVID-19 大流行将加剧贫困状况。它预测贫困率可能会上升 0.3 到 0.7 个百分点，到 2020 年达到 9% 左右。本研究旨在提供对巴基斯坦贫困的洞察，并分析财政分权对扶贫的影响。根据亚洲开发银行的数据，巴基斯坦约有 2.1 亿贫困人口。本研究遵循 1975 年至 2018 年之间的数据，应用单位根检验对这些数据进行站位。统计模型的开发考虑到用于估计的自回归分布式滞后协整技术。研究结果得出结论，财政分权对消除贫困具有直接和间接影响。因此，我们得出结论，政府应该赋予巴基斯坦各省自治权，因为单靠中央政府无法解决和了解当地的问题。因此，政府必须采取财政分权政策。本研究进一步建议政府应有效利用累进税制策略，以实现收入最大化和扶贫。